Chapter 81: The Gilded Chain
The peace of the cottage had a new, deeper texture. It was not the fragile, watchful silence of before the blight, nor the exhausted, communal healing of their time at the Anchor. It was a settled, vibrant quiet, woven through with the sounds of their reclaimed life: the rhythm of Kaelen's axe splitting wood for winter, the soft murmur of Elara reading to Aurora, the scratch of Lyra's chalk on her slate as she composed a pictographic letter to Tessa.
It was into this rich, domestic tapestry that the imperial messenger cut like a blade of cold steel.
